London, October 18: It may sound strange, but it seems to be true. Victorian doctors recognised love sickness as a medical illness and prescribed sex as a treatment.
Dr Lesel Dawson of the University of Bristol, who carried out the research, said that feelings of love sickness were particularly prevalent when people were not allowed to express love. This caused anger and frustration and turned into a mental illness.
"Love sickness was quite often a 'class-crossed' love when a rich person was in love with a servant but they weren't allowed to express that," she said.
Dr Dawson, whose results are published in the book Lovesickness and Gender in Early Modern English Literature said that the best cure was seen to be sex - and this would often be recommended to the patient's family.
She said, "According to early writers, sex expelled the lover's excess blood and seed, which accumulated in the body and putrefied, releasing harmful vapours that could cause melancholy".
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